


I'm not anti-social, I'm pro-solitude

by NeasieB



Category: Ghosts (TV 2019)
Genre: Character Study, Gen, Introversion, happy and peaceful, not at all lonely
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-30
Updated: 2021-01-30
Packaged: 2021-03-16 13:15:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 989
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29082999
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NeasieB/pseuds/NeasieB
Summary: Jemimalikeshaunting the pantry on her own. It isn't that she's scared of company or cripplingly shy, she just likes being on her own.
Comments: 6
Kudos: 34





	I'm not anti-social, I'm pro-solitude

Jemima _likes _haunting the pantry on her own. She likes being quiet and being alone with her own thoughts. “Don't you get lonely?” Miss Kitty sometimes asks her, but she can truly say she doesn't. She's seen many children pass through Button House in the centuries since her death. Some grew up and moved away. Others died but didn't stay. She feels she ought to be sad about that, but she isn't. Another ghost child would talk to her and want her to play with them all the time, and she wouldn't like that at all.__

__She can join in with the group when she wants to, and even enjoys it. She'll go along to one of the clubs Mr Butcher runs and listen as Mistress Mary tells them how to bake bread, or the Captain talks about battlefield logistics, whatever they are. Mr Butcher always looks very pleased when she decides to join them. Sometimes she'll sing a song, and the others will clap and smile. But mostly she prefers to listen, and before long she'll drift back to the peace of her quiet pantry. It isn't that she's scared of company or cripplingly shy, she just likes being on her own. She always has. When she was alive the villagers called her “strange”, “standoffish”, “unnatural”. She'd hear them whisper as she went past “Thinks she's better than us. That one's sure to end up hanged as a witch one day”. The other ghosts are always very kind to her, but she knows they think she's a bit odd and even scary. Once Mr Fawcett called her a loner and pulled a funny face and said “It's always the quiet loners you end up reading about in the papers”. The others had said “Shush” and “For shame”, and Lady Button had said “That's a terrible thing to say. She's only a child”, and the Captain had said “You're hardly one to talk about ending up in the papers, Julian”, and Mr Fawcett had never said it again. She honestly doesn't think she's better than everyone else. She just likes being on her own, that's all._ _

__She was the oldest girl of a large family and so had been expected to help care for the younger children from when she herself was very young. She'd always seemed to have had a toddler pulling at her skirts, demanding her attention, when all she really wanted to do was to go off by herself and think. She loved to daydream about the folklore and fairy tales she heard from the village elders, and sing old songs and nursery rhymes to herself. Sometimes she even made up stories and little verses. Nothing as grand as Mr Thorne's poetry, of course. He is a Gentleman and Educated. But they made her happy. Some of the happiest times when she was alive were when she was sent to mind the flocks of geese. She'd sit on the bank, spinning wool on her drop spindle (“the Devil makes work for idle hands, Jemima”), and singing, with no one to hear but the big, silly birds._ _

__Of course she still likes to play. She's a child. She will sometimes join in a jolly game of hide and seek with the grownups. Occasionally she and Miss Kitty will have a pretend tea party for her dolly (that's very grand – Dolly would never have been able to afford tea when she was alive). But her favourite games are solitary ones. She's glad that when she died she was not only cuddling Dolly, but also had her knucklebones set in her pocket. They gave it to her brother afterwards, but she will have the ghostly game with her forever and she can play with it for hours if she's left in peace. She's not selfish and will play it with the grownups if they want. Robin is especially good at it. It's a rare day when she beats him. She is fascinated to wonder if this game is so old that Robin might have played it when he was alive. She wishes she'd had her skipping rope in her pocket too, but Mother used to say no one can have everything they want, not even the King._ _

__Sometimes she'll carry Sir Humphrey's head to the pantry and they'll spend the afternoon talking about all sorts of interesting things. Mother would have said a village girl shouldn't bother an important nobleman like him, but he has so many interesting stories and always listens so intently to the stories she tells him that he feels like a friend, not someone far above her in station._ _

__One day she heard someone talking on the radio in Mr and Mrs Cooper's kitchen about people like her. (It's funny they're called Cooper because she's never seen them make a barrel). The lady said they were called “introverts” and although the world often thought they were strange, in fact it was just as good as noisy sociability, and could be just as happy. She likes having a name for what she is. It makes her feel less odd. “I'm an introvert,” she whispers to herself as she drifts around the pantry, alone and happy._ _

__She often thinks she would like reading if she were able to do it. Of course, she's never been taught how. Reading in her time wasn't for girls and certainly not for village girls. Perhaps she could learn now. Mrs Cooper is teaching Mistress Mary so perhaps she will teach her too, if she asks nicely. She'd like that. She could learn some new stories. There must have been lots written since she was alive. And perhaps she can spend some time haunting the library as well as her pantry. She's heard that libraries are good places for introverts like her. But in the meantime she's quite happy here in the pantry, singing her nursery rhymes and playing with Dolly, alone._ _

**Author's Note:**

> Why yes, I _am _projecting. Why do you ask?__


End file.
